Paris: A Few Thousand Protesters And Clashes Against The “Police Violence”

Several thousand people demonstrated in Paris on Sunday against “police violence” at the call of several organizations, a few weeks after the “Theo case” which had resulted in urban violence in the suburbs of Paris.

The demonstration, which gathered 7,000 to 7,500 people according to the prefecture of police, was enameled by some clashes between some participants hooded and law enforcement officials, AFP reporters said.

Leaving the Place de la Nation at 14.30 behind a banner entitled “Justice and Dignity, Stopping Police Impunity”, flanked by portraits of 13 people presented as victims of police violence, the demonstrators arrived at the Place de la République at around 5 pm.

They responded to the appeal of anti-racist organizations with heterogeneous horizons, from the League of Human Rights (LDH) to the Indigenes of the Republic, to which joined the LDH (League of the rights of the man), CGT , FSU and the Movement Against Racism and Friendship among Peoples (MRAP), but not SOS Racism, which denounced a “logic of confrontation”.Throughout the march, the crowd chanted slogans such as “Zyed, Bouna, Theo, and Adama, do not forget, do not forgive”, “Police everywhere, justice nowhere” or “urgency, urgency, The police assassinate with impunity “.

In the procession were flags of the NPA (New Anti-Capitalist Party), DAL (Right to Housing), Attac, CGT, CNT, and a Solidaires ball, and the placards read: “Les bamboulas, bougnouls, The niakou (…) bother you “.

The protest occurred after the alleged rape of young Theo, 22, in early February, by a police officer at his arrest in Aulnay-sous-Bois (Seine-Saint-Denis), which had resulted in several nights of urban violence in the Parisian suburbs.

“Theo is not just an exception, we are here to remind you that it is not a matter of isolated news, it’s not a bug, it’s part of a system,” AFP told AFP. Lucile Moigno-Flaux, 25, and Jasmine Morice, 21 years old.

– ‘A better world’ –

Coming with her 16-month-old daughter, Beatrice, a video producer, is there because “it’s important for the future” of her daughter, “to live in a better, fairer world.”

“My brother’s murderer has been convicted but there are still other families for whom it is not,” one of Amal Bentounsi’s sisters, Amine’s sister, was killed by a bullet in the Back by a police officer sentenced on appeal to 5 years suspended the sentence.Demonstrations have also taken place in some provincial cities, as in Montpellier (nearly 200 participants), Toulouse (about 200) and Nantes (a few dozen), police sources said.

The first major demonstration against police violence gathered between 3,500 and 10,000 people in October 2015, 10 years after the riots in the Paris suburbs following the deaths of two teenagers in a transformer, according to sources.

On Sunday, while the demonstration was held in peace, a thousand people hooded, at the end of the procession, disrupted its progress, according to a statement from the prefecture of police.

Demonstrations have also taken place in some provincial cities, as in Montpellier (nearly 200 participants), Toulouse (about 200) and Nantes (a few dozen), police sources said.

The first major demonstration against police violence gathered between 3,500 and 10,000 people in October 2015, 10 years after the riots in the Paris suburbs following the deaths of two teenagers in a transformer, according to sources.On Sunday, while the demonstration was held in peace, a thousand people hooded, at the end of the procession, disrupted its progress, according to a statement from the prefecture of police.

Molotov projectiles and cocktails were thrown at the police, who responded with tear gas, said AFP.

During the clashes, two gendarmes were slightly wounded and transported to the hospital, said the prefecture. Three people were arrested for carrying weapons and degradation, she said.

Urban real estate and the windows of five banking institutions have been degraded, according to the same source.

Filters upstream of the demonstration had recovered several projectiles and a bag of paving stones hidden in a flowerpot on the course of the demonstration, the statement added.